20.10.04
lion city day 16
The consensus is that Venice Studio 2004 will be somewhat of a failure if the students depart without contributing something of value to this city that is facing a complicated web of ecological, cultural, and economic problems. This is our struggle: to become citizens and not tourists. And though, in order to take advantage of the October weather, we have frequently been tromping about with our cameras and sketchbooks at hand, I must commend Nicholas on his efforts to get us plugged-in to the network of characters and organizations that are dealing directly with the task at hand. As to be expected, there are no clear answers to dealing with the tides of tourists or the Adriatic, and the Italian bureaucracy is staggering. Today is one of our rare open dates, so I will offer a few terms that seem significant in our first two weeks in a place where the fabric has changed little in 500 years, and a city of residents is outnumbered by a city of strangers.
_aqua alta | (image)
Signaled by siren, the high water has come twice now, if only in moderate ferocity. The locals immediately strap on the boots. Sometimes it seems almost convenient as two coexisting and conflicting pedestrian networks (tourist Venice and resident Venice) are temporarily separated by the high water. The normally outnumbered locals move about with relative ease, wading through 6 inches of water in their boots, as the tourists move painfully slowly on the boardwalks raised 2 feet above. The peak tides of tourists (summer) and water (winter) operate reciprocally, but when the tides overlap, the pedestrian networks separate, and the locals fight the lagoon for supremacy over the streets.
_fabio carrera | (his site) and (national geographic video sample)
A native Venetian and director of Worcester Polytechnic Institute’s Venice Project Center, we met with him at the VPC, a room the size of Dick Smith’s office, and he presented their work. Fabio is excited that we are here and that we want to do something for his city. He has been an invaluable resource and has literally made us see the city in a different way: like seeing it from a rowboat in the middle of the grand canal in the dark, while learning to row Venetian style, standing up. I never thought to have the opportunity to see the city that way. He can speak as a student of the city fabric, but also as a student of the city’s social structure, and has provided a peek into how long it takes to get things done, and how complicated the relationships are. When asked if the locals want the tourists dispersed off the main route to reduce congestion or concentrated on the main route to keep them out of the neighborhoods, he answered that it depends on who you ask and the location of their shop.
_moto ondoso | (image)
The term refers to excess wake created by motorboats. By the calculations of the VPC, boat traffic has increased by 50%, while local population has decreased by 50% in the last 25 years. The culprit is tourism. The wake from increased boat traffic is literally taking the buildings apart, and the “stop moto ondoso” signs are the most common public protest in the city. A temporary breakwater has been constructed in front of St. Marks square where mostly gondolas call. I had a personal encounter with moto ondoso as Fabio, Robin and I rowed Fabio’s boat to his rowing club in the dark with no running lights. An ambulence screamed by us doing at least 35mph and I was the one not rowing (sitting on the bow). Fabio turned the bow into the wake to keep us from capsizing, and it crashed over my back: I was moto ondoso-ed.
_city knowledge | (gis site)
The title of Fabio’s dissertation at MIT. The VPC takes an attitude about information and the city. It gathers information that results in different ways of looking at problems and how to solve them. For example, in an effort to reduce boat traffic and fight moto ondoso, they decided first to accurately document the current frieght delivery system. Students took a daily count of delivery boats at several of the small docks that dot the neighborhoods. At a single dock on a single day, they counted 96 boats, but they also figured out that the number of packages that passed through that particular dock could be fit onto three boats. As a result, they have worked with the delivery workers union to reorganize the deliveries by location instead of by product. Projections indicate that delivery boat traffic should be reduced by 60%. Fabio is now THE resource for infrastructural information in Venice. The city public works department purchases it from him.
_limits of acceptable change
The fabric of Venice survives, partially because plan changes to walls resting on the unstable lagoon mud require foundation modification that is a massive construction undertaking. Preservation here is a constant process and one that functions as an inhibitor to the evolution of the urban ecology. The has city taken a “demolition by neglect” approach to what it calls “non-conforming buildings” which mostly means anything built since the mid 19th century. These structures are not eligible for state renovation and upkeep funding. The work of Carlos Scarpa falls within this category. We will be testing “limits of acceptable change.” In order to get something done, a slow process must be set in motion, but almost unperceivably. Fabio understands that the Venetians can only hold on to so much, and tells the story of the paving stones in the campi. They are carefully numbered when renovation work is undertaken and put back in exactly the same spot. Yet to remove the stones from the mortar, the masons chip little bits off every time. Now they are finding that when they put the stones back, they cannot cover the campo.
_venetian color | (1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8)
In attempting to document the vibrant colors an textures on the surfaces of Venice, I have been confronted with something I did not expect. As a result of the unique urban fabric, graffiti is abundant here. Lines of sight are very short, and at night the city is deafeningly silent, and approaching pedestrians can be heard long before they are seen. The marks range in scale and content. They are political and aesthetic.
_unesco | venice office
One of the major players in the high water issue., the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization’s regional office for eastern Europe is in Venice. Fabio seems to believe that, as there no Venetians working at the office, Venice itself has become less of a priority. We attended a meeting last week that was an official UN function with translators and whole bit. It was also great introduction into the machinery of progress. The first few speakers spent most of their time thanking all the various corrupt governmental organizations for their support. It was basically a press conference for UNESCO to release a book on the ongoing lagoon research, and the progress of the controversial MOSE system that will put gates at the openings to the lagoon to stop the high tides. Residents then were allowed to ask questions. The first was about the survival of Venetian culture. The old man said that when a ship is going down, you save the passengers and not the ship. He falls in line with Fabio’s assertion that Venice will be here in one hundred years, but that Venetians may not.
_walker venetian ranger | (image)
I will close with the one American who has been befriended by the locals. Rocking the airwaves several times per day, Televenezia can’t seem to get enough of Chuck Norris. Strap on the skin tight Wranglers, and pull a roundhouse in the leather trenchcoat as a barn explodes in the background, and you’re sure to win the crowd.
. . . surprises around every corner. | grand canale
ciao.
tommy.pollman
Posted by tommy at 19:51 | Comments (700)